In the Service of Industrialization: Etatism, Social Services and the Construction of Industrial Labour Forces in Turkey (1930–50)

This article explains the employment practices at Turkish state factories during the 1930s and 1940s when the state expanded industrial activity. Complaints about the availability of industrial workers had been commonplace since the population exchange, but emerged as a key constraint on industrial activity in the 1930s and 1940s, as industrial production expanded considerably. The article argues that the Turkish state introduced social services in Turkish state factories in response to workers' resistance to the low wages and long hours of work. Rather than a deliberate attempt at populism or building political support, the expansion of social amenities through state economic enterprises reflected the weakness of the state in enforcing industrial discipline and the limitations of creating industrial labour forces through compulsion.